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Despite uncertainty over who owns crucial property rights, Toronto city council is moving ahead with plans for a 21-acre park over the downtown rail corridor.

On Wednesday, council voted unanimously to take the first of many necessary steps to study the proposed park — a project on which Mayor John Tory has in part staked his legacy. Council also moved to initiate a process that would protect the air space over the active rail lands as parkland. The approval includes an initial $2.4 million in spending.

“We’re trying to build one great city well served by its parks,” Tory said on the floor of council, after his some of his colleagues questioned the cost, the location and the complication of developers wanting to build condos in the same space.

“This is the last chance we have to do something bold. Yes, it’s downtown, but it’s for the whole city and it’s for a part that is deficient and it’s about city building and it’s about making sure that 15 years from now, when I promise you I’ll be long gone from here, they’ll be saying that they did the right thing to make sure Toronto still remained the most livable city in the world.”

The cost to construct the park totals at least $1.05 billion if the city decks over the entire 21 acres from Bathurst St. to Blue Jays Way. Those are early estimates that do not include the cost to purchase the air rights over the rail lands. Those costs are still unknown.

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Council’s decision comes a day after letters from two Toronto law firms confirmed an Etobicoke-based developer, Craft Acquisitions Corporation agreed to purchase the air rights over the relevant portion of the rail lands from CN Rail and Toronto Terminals Railway in December 2013.

But those letters do not say the rights have actually changed hands. No one connected to the deal has disclosed the details of that agreement and whether it is conditional on the developer being able to build condos on the site.

The lands are currently zoned for transportation uses. Council agreed on Wednesday to look at rezoning the area as parkland, protecting it against future development.

Councillors questioned why they were just learning of the developer’s claims to the air rights days before the council meeting and why the lawyers’ letters, dated Sept. 15, had not been circulated earlier.

“We expect it’s an agreement that has conditions. We’ve not seen those conditions,” deputy city manager John Livey told council. “Those conditions are likely to be conditional upon development approvals for some scale of development, condos presumably.”

City staff said they have met with Craft, beginning in August 2015.

A detailed proposal to build has not been submitted or made public, but Councillor Joe Cressy, whose ward includes the corridor, earlier told the Star that it included seven to 10 towers and some park space.

“Craft was going to be giving the city eight acres of park,” said Councillor Jim Karygiannis, who has been in communication with the developer. He questioned why the city would not entertain that proposal.

“If this is a legacy for somebody to leave behind, $1 billion? That legacy costs a lot of money.”

Some councillors tried to make Wednesday’s debate about enduring urban-suburban divides, questioning spending more than $1 billion on a downtown park.

A successful motion from Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti (Ward 7, York West), asked for information on “deficiencies in parks in the suburbs.”

According to staff, the city would need to build a park 1.5 times the size of High Park just to keep up with growth downtown, saying the area where the rail deck park is proposed is one of the most deficient in the city.

A motion by the newest member of council, Michael Ford, to defer the mayor’s key item until the January meeting failed 3-29.

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